Lade - Hot, dry and sunny, E2 - Spent the morning on the local patch (until it got too hot for both us!) birding and blackberrying where there was plenty of both across the site, including the first autumn drop-in of four Wheatears on the desert along with six Stonechats and two Yellow Wagtails, plus several more wagtails overhead calling. The scrub around the ponds was jumping with warblers: Sedge, Reed and Willow Warblers, Chiffs, Common and Lesser Whitethroats, a Blackcap and a single Garden Warbler (scarce here) which very nearly got taken by a Sparrowhawk as it plunged into the sallows feet first. The lakes were busy with Little and Great White Egrets, Grey Herons and two Common Sandpipers around the margins while hundreds of smaller gulls hawked flying insects rising off the water. South lake had a good selection of diving ducks, Coots, Great Crested and Little Grebes, two Black-necked Grebes, a late brood of Tufted ducklings plus several pulses of Sand Martins moving south. On the way home I had to pause at Lydd to pick up some wine-making gear where 120 House Martins were hawking flying ants over the Rype; back home at NR this afternoon I noted a steady trickle of southbound Swallows over the garden to complete the suite of migrating hirundines.
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